


Top Shelf: James Fitzjames, Polar Researcher

by badwig



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, being a newlywed, slightly niche framing devices
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:33:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27570826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/badwig/pseuds/badwig
Summary: "The best skincare experience of my life was the Geisha Facial at the Island Spa in Brighton. There's no way around this: they put bird shit on your face. It's nightingale shit, if that helps. When I saw [my husband] Francis afterwards, he said, "Christ, you look amazing, what've you done?" and I had to explain I'd paid quite a lot of money for a very nice woman to put bird shit on my face. He had a lot of fun with that."
Relationships: Captain Francis Crozier/Commander James Fitzjames
Comments: 37
Kudos: 85





	Top Shelf: James Fitzjames, Polar Researcher

"I was born in Rio, but I grew up in England. I'll spare you my whole, you know, Dickensian backstory, but I was brought up by my - well, foster parents, but we always said aunt and uncle. And my aunt is the most glamorous person I've ever met, and if you met her she'd probably be the most glamorous person you'd ever met (laughs). As kids, my brother and I would put on these plays - or I put them on and roped him in - that were just flimsy excuses to try on all her clothes and mess around with her makeup. Really, they were less plays and more sort of tableaux of us in different dresses. I loved it, I really did. I think if I hadn't ended up in climatology I'd be putting on, like, absolutely appalling one-woman shows. In retrospect, it's quite nice that Lou and Rob were so relaxed about the whole thing. Two lefty philosophy professors, so it was that sort of household.

EDUCATION + CAREER

People skills are everything. Even in the sciences. Maybe more so, since they're in slightly short supply. I mean, I more or less schmoozed my way into a PhD program at Cambridge. Not that I wasn't - well, I wasn't a _great_ student. I had a bit of a complex about it all, honestly, but at this point I've mostly outgrown the 'best little boy in the world' thing. Mostly (laughs).

Anyway, I was initially studying geomagnetism, but that was a bit of a disaster, and I ended up in climate science. And for a while I sort of just had a PhD for no reason, but then there was the PEARL [Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory]. That was an experience. Life-defining, in a lot of ways. Nunavut is one of the most beautiful places in the world, and Eureka especially is just this sort of arctic Eden, it's amazing. 

Although the whole place absolutely is trying to kill you, make no mistake. I was quite gung ho about it all at first, but it has a way of knocking you down a peg. If the cold doesn't get you, the lemmings will - I mean it, they're vicious (laughs). People always want a polar bear story, but the polar bears were fine, no dramas at all. That specific population is weirdly thriving at the minute because of a fluke with the ice melt - more sunlight on the ocean, more abundant resources. Won't last, but for now they're fat and happy. They left us alone. I should probably just make up a polar bear story, that would be the polite thing to do.

I do have a cheetah story, which doubles as a product recommendation: if you ever find yourself in a third-hand Renault Clio with one of your dearest, stupidest friends and an _allegedly_ tranquilised cheetah cub, and the inevitable happens and you have to save him from the cheetah cub, I suggest  Dermatix Silicone Scar Sheets for the aftermath.

SKINCARE

From a skincare perspective, the Arctic is an absolute nightmare. I don't think I've ever looked worse in my life, including when I had actual malaria. Though it is where I met my husband, so maybe I didn't look as bad as all that. Or maybe he's just not terribly picky. But my God, moisturising is a losing battle that far north. I think I was essentially mummified. Lanolin is the only thing that makes a dent; no La Mer, just sheep grease.

By contrast, the best skincare experience of my life was the  Geisha Facial at the Island Spa in Brighton. There's no way around this: they put bird shit on your face. It's nightingale shit, if that helps. It's called _Uguisu no fun_ in Japanese. It just really, really works. When I saw [my husband] Francis afterwards, he said, "Christ, you look amazing, what've you done?" and I had to explain I'd paid quite a lot of money for a very nice woman to put bird shit on my face. He had a lot of fun with that.

He's not into this stuff at all. I couldn't get him to use hand cream _in the Arctic._ Do you know how dry your hands get in the Arctic? He's lucky they didn't just drop off in protest, like when crabs shed their legs. I would try to cajole him into it like, "Come on, it's lanolin, it's not Crabtree & Evelyn. Sailors use it, it's really butch." Wasn't interested. The only thing he'll use is sunscreen, and that's only because of a sustained bullying campaign on my part. What he had been doing was just getting burnt to a crisp and then suffering through it. And he's Irish, so we're talking, like, skin grafts. You'd be forgiven for assuming a Catholic upbringing with that level of commitment to mortifying the flesh, but no. Anyway, he likes the  Ultrasun mineral baby suncream. He has to use baby suncream because he's got preternaturally sensitive skin. Constant hives. I probably shouldn't have told you that (laughs).

I might be too far in the other direction. With toiletries, not hives. I just really enjoy sort of lotions and potions. I love a good serum, especially. Actually, did you know vitamin C serum oxidises and stops working if you leave it out on the counter? I didn't. That was a very recent discovery for me, and I've been using the stuff for years. It's quite humbling, really, to think how much more radiant I could be right now if not for my own hubris and the caprices of mother nature. I've just got a new one, it's The C, The C, The Open C by Goldner Cosmeceuticals. Dreadful name, but it seems okay. I'm keeping it in the fridge. We live and learn.

HAIR

I'm losing my hair. I've reached an interesting midway point in terms of vanity where I'm trying very hard to not be losing my hair, but I'm also telling everyone about it. At first I spent a few months in denial, pretending to have discovered a passion for stupid little woolly hats. Don't do that. Go for broke, immediately. Full on chemical warfare. Get a derma-roller and some minoxidil foam. You run the roller over your scalp until it's beading blood and then you foam it. It's gruesome but it works. Although, disclaimer, I asked my friend who has two thirds of a medical degree - he dropped out to be a marine biologist - if it was okay, and he got quite worried. And very quietly judgmental.

Also, if you come home extremely drunk, just give it a miss and go to bed, or you might end up staring at yourself in the bathroom mirror at four a.m., bleeding profusely at the hairline and having a bit of a long dark night of the soul. Not that I'm speaking from experience.

FRAGRANCE

For years and years my signature scent was this really slutty Tom Ford number that I absolutely loved, but I had to give it up because it gives Francis an unbearable headache. The first time we saw each other back in England he had on this very pained face, and I was like, hand wanly to brow, "O, our love was a tender Arctic rose and it's withered in the London gloom," but no, he had a migraine. My new standby is  Gentlewoman by Juliette Has A Gun. I think it's quite unisex, despite the name, though I suppose that's true of anything if you put your mind to it.

NAILS

I can't let anyone else do my nails because I start micromanaging and barking orders. I suspect I might have rather been the terror of Soho's salons, for a bit. Recently, I had a thing where - I've got a bit of an autoimmune thing and I had a flare-up, and my hands were… well, my husband tried doing my nails for me and it almost ended in divorce. Normally, I do a sort of home manicure once a fortnight, usually just with a clear polish. I like the Dior Nail Glow, which is slightly pink-tinted and makes you look like you've got wonderful circulation - which I haven't, I'm always freezing. For special occasions, or on a whim, I'll do proper nail varnish. My slightly embarrassing favourite is Revlon's Cherries in the Snow. My aunt used to use it, so it's quite nostalgic. I've got the matching lipstick, too, which I'm aware is profoundly naff, but I don't know, I'm an old-fashioned girl (laughs). 

HEALTH + FITNESS

I walk. I did run - ultramarathons, in fact - and then my joints gave up the ghost a few decades early, and now I walk. I quite like it, actually. I'm very good at it, but so are, you know, most humans, evolutionarily speaking. Francis and I did the Camino de Santiago quite recently, and that was lovely, except there were all these guys on bikes. I mean, it's ostensibly a pilgrimage, it doesn't feel quite in the spirit of the thing. Though my objection is more aesthetic than theological, I admit. Also, I don't know, I'm not Jesus, maybe He doesn't mind (laughs). 

I eat really, really clean, but it's because I've got rheumatoid arthritis, which is a bit of a bastard. One of the first things they told me when I was diagnosed is that the western diet is basically proinflammatory poison, and to start avoiding processed carbs and saturated fats. I was quite annoyed because I'd been mostly doing that anyway out of simple vanity, and look where it got me (laughs). I'm also on a biologic [antirheumatic drug], which has been a total lifesaver; my doctor always compares it to a sniper because it just targets the inflammation and takes it out. The symptoms actually started when I was in Nunavut, which apparently isn't uncommon - for it to show up in your thirties, not in Nunavut. I was joking/kvetching to my friend Harry - he of the near-miss medical degree - that I _clearly_ had scurvy because I felt so abjectly shit, and he quizzed me a bit and then very gently suggested trying to get hold of a rheumatologist on the mainland. 

MURDER + MARRIAGE + GOUT (?)

If you're single and maybe starting to slightly get on your friends' nerves about it, I have some advice for you: go to the Arctic. Just go to the Arctic and see what you can stir up. That's not why I went, obviously, but it works. Admittedly, there's a certain amount of mortal peril involved, but isn't there always?

Though I won't lie, it was a rocky start. Polar research stations are hotbeds of interpersonal mayhem, you may or may not be surprised to learn. I think in Antarctica some Russians murdered each other over a chess game, which is a bit 'there but for the grace of God' because we had the pieces but no board. Francis and I still spent a lot of time coming very close to murdering each other. There was another guy who came out with us - John, or maybe Tom? Sorry, John or Tom - who would try to sort of mediate, but quite early on he got, like, really bad gout in one leg and had to go home? I don't know. I didn't think people still got gout. I'm pretty sure he just missed his wife, honestly. Talked about her a _lot_.

Anyway, ultimately we decided against murdering each other, and a bit over three months ago we got married. It's a _very_ long story, but the point is that you can do a lot worse than shacking up with some guy you met on your slightly harrowing working holiday." 

—as told to ITG 

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I've moved the polar bears over a bit - this is actually happening with the ones in the nearby Kane Basin. Also, the Russian chess guys didn't murder each other: one came at the other with an ice axe and may or not have actually killed him. It also may or may not have actually happened.


End file.
